


a tower of fear by the river

by 1001cranes



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Compulsion, Dubious Consent, Episode: s02e09 Party Guessed, M/M, Mildly Dubious Consent, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-01
Updated: 2012-10-01
Packaged: 2017-11-15 11:06:47
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/526612
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/1001cranes/pseuds/1001cranes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jackson doesn't go looking for Matt on purpose. He's fairly sure.</p>
<p>A missing scene from Party Guessed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	a tower of fear by the river

**Author's Note:**

> I was literally falling asleep when this idea came to me. Inspired, in part, by [this](http://roseandthebeast.tumblr.com/post/32346218951/so-at-first-i-was-like-bwahhaahh-i-wish-this-would) and [this](http://roseandthebeast.tumblr.com/post/32476255629/ladyw1nter-saucefactory-matt-just-matt) gif set going around on tumblr ( **trigger warning** for discussion of rape, trauma, PTSD in the second set)
> 
> also, on rewatching this episode, I realized the cops came LITERALLY the second Matt stalks off, so, uh – pretend it took more like a half an hour.
> 
> thanks to anatsuno for the beta <3

Look, Jackson knows he’s not the hero. He’s not the nice guy and frankly, he doesn’t want to be. Nice guys are losers, and they finish fucking last. Just about everyone in this town is proof of that. That said, letting Matt Daehler flounder around in the pool because everyone else is too drunk to deal just seems like the ultimate party foul. It takes all of two seconds to reach in and pull him out, and _then_ everyone seems to have time to stare. 

“What are you looking at?”

And the thing is, Matt’s obviously fine. He’s breathing, he’s not lying on the bottom of the pool turning blue. He yelled. Jackson takes that as a pretty good sign of health, himself. But for some reason, Jackson can't _quite_ get it out of his head how scared Matt looked, underneath the anger. Almost – terrified. Jackson knows terror. He looked it in the face, recently. He knows how it feels, settling in your bones and running through your blood. How that doesn’t even cover the half of it. Real terror sits inside you. Gnaws at your guts. 

Right now Jackson doesn’t feel terrified. He feels – agro. He feels like he could rip the heads off of everyone at this party, and not just because they’re acting like idiots. Not just because Lydia hasn’t taken more than two seconds to try and talk to him. Not just because he spent half an hour floating around the party, hiding from his own worst enemy. He feels like he could tear down the world. 

But that’s not a new feeling, so.

He wouldn't say he goes _looking_ for Matt. Deliberately. Just that he happens to find him sitting in part of the foyer, dripping. His knees pulled up and his face tucked into them. Jackson could walk right by, but there was really no sense in letting someone have a nervous breakdown at the party. Particularly not one of Lydia’s parties – she’d probably come back around and finish Matt’s half-assed attempt at drowning. 

"Hey," Jackson says. "Daehler. You okay?" He doesn't make a point of being polite, like, _ever_ , but - something tells him Matt deserves this. Needs it.

Matt lifts his head and stares at Jackson, who takes a half-step back, completely independent of any thought. There’s a phrase Jackson’s heard before – the thousand yard stare? – and Matt has it in spades. 

"Matt. Dude." Jackson forces himself to take another few steps forward. The look on Matt’s face is still blank. Totally blank. Terrifyingly blank. Like he's not even there. "You... Hello? Anyone home?”

Still nothing.

"Matt." Jackson can't account for the trembling of his own voice. "Matt. You're okay. You're okay, right?" he asks, fervently, like it even fucking matters to him. This random fucking dude who managed to shove himself into Jackson’s life – talking techno geekery with Danny; dating Allison, maybe – who the hell is he, even? And what could it possibly matter to Jackson? He doesn’t make a habit of caring. Not worth the energy. As he’s learned, he rarely gets anything back in return. 

But it does matter, somehow. Seems… imperative, even. Jackson’s been to a lot of parties with a lot of people. They’re shit shows, usually; alcohol, drugs, teenage tempers and hormones, a severe lack of impulse controls – hell, if someone _doesn’t cry_ , people didn’t have nearly good enough of a time – but this seems different, somehow. And not just because of the hallucinations.

After another moment Jackson puts his hand on Matt’s shoulder. Doesn’t know if he should, honestly, doesn’t know if that might make Matt flip out or upset him more or just… end badly, but he does it. Feels the sodden cloth under his fingers.

"I'm okay," Matt says finally, and he looks at Jackson, actually focuses on him. Creepy-stare gone. But Jackson can hear the lie in his voice, knows it’s a lie. The worst kind of lie there is - the one you practice in the mirror every morning and every night, trying to make it perfect, trying to get it just right so that maybe you start to believe it along with everyone else. 

"You’re not," he says. He sits down next to Matt on the bench, damp puddle and all. "Matt. What the fuck? Tell me. Just - tell me how to make it better." He’s getting ramped up again, anxious. The world’s going to hell and he can’t fix a bit of it.

And there’s something in Matt’s eyes. 

“You do,” Matt says, “you have,” the strangest smile on his face, like a child’s smile. A sad one. It’s genuinely creepy, which is why Jackson can’t really explain what he does next.

Jackson slides his hand up the side of Matt’s neck, and kisses him.

It’s not a great kiss, technically speaking. Short. A little wet, and Jackson means that literally, because Matt’s hair is still dripping. The overly sweet taste of punch in Jackson’s mouth, his chapped lips. The nervous, angry pounding in his head and the muffled noise of surprise Matt makes.

Matt’s eyes are wide when Jackson pulls back, and he thinks about running. He always thinks about running, but then Matt’s hands slip onto his shoulders, his chest, and dig in desperately. All ten fingers like ten separate bruises. More desperately than Lydia ever did, more than any of the other girls Jackson hooked up with when they were on break before. Like he doesn’t care that he seems needy. Like he needs Jackson, in a way no one has ever needed Jackson. Like Jackson is grabbing him, pulling him out of the pool all over again. Like a life-line. Like life support. Like air. 

"It’s okay," Jackson says, nonsensically, even has he knows it’s not fucking okay, it never is, he hasn't been okay since he was five years old - even less now, never a little bit better. He can't even fucking manage _okay_ , like a fucking emo song on repeat. “It’s okay, it is,” he repeats, and Matt snuffles, softly, Jackson’s hands cupped tight around his face. Holding him just so, just in place. Jackson doesn’t even know Matt’s damage and he knows it’s not all right. Knows there’s no fixing it, there’s only – soldiering on, keeping up the façade so no one can see you’re crumbling on the inside. Rotting.

When Jackson kisses Matt again, he mostly tastes the sting of chlorine - not quite bitter, but acidic. Sour. Like water that isn’t fresh, really; just maintaining the illusion. Jackson opens his mouth, sucks on Matt’s upper lip, thinks maybe if he could lick that taste out, the sting of it – get to whatever Matt is like, really, underneath.

“Come on,” Jackson says, and pulls Matt to his feet. Drags them both down the hallway to the linen closet; more of a linen room, enough blankets and sheets for an invading army, if the invading army’s taste ran towards Ethan Allen. Clean and warm. Jackson tugs handfuls of them onto the floor, a nest of them, and then he pulls Matt on top of him. Yanks. Demanding.

“Yeah,” Matt says, “yes, please, just –“ and they’re grappling together, pulling off Matt’s wet clothes, fighting with them, peeling them off, thick and heavy, and Jackson feels Matt’s hands dip under his shirt, into his jeans, and he gasps in Matt’s mouth. It feels good all of a sudden, it feels so unbelievably good. Like something he never knew he wanted, this patchwork body next to him – warm inside, in Matt’s mouth and between his legs, even if his skin is shocked and pale and cold.

“Come on,” he says, “come on,” and he doesn’t even know what he’s asking for, but it doesn’t matter because Matt takes everything. Easily. Greedily. Anything Jackson offers and more. Jackson’s never even done this before, not really. Handjobs with Danny when they were younger – not so much once Danny came out to him, not _because_ Danny was gay, but this certain unspoken agreement that maybe Jackson really was Danny’s type, and that wasn’t fair to either of them – but Jackson has never even really kissed a guy, not when it wasn’t a dare or a drunken game, never let a guy press hot, open-mouthed kisses down his chest, never let a guy lave at his abs, not ever; never let a guy take his cock in hand and mercilessly rub his own between Jackson’s legs, no, this is _beyond_ , this is – Jackson won’t say this is something he hasn’t thought about, but only in the abstract, maybe: Lahey’s perfect curls in his hands, Stilinski’s smart mouth around his dick. Even remembering Hale’s mouth against his hip can get him half-hard. But it’s never been real. Never something he thought would happen, or something he’d thought to seek out on his own.

And yet, here he is. The hallmark of Jackson’s life lately. Finding himself in unexpected places.

He thinks he sobs into Matt’s mouth when he comes, when Matt _tells_ him to come. A little shaky, a little wet around the edges. A push of air like the last gasp from his lungs. It feels – different. Like the scope of his world is the push of his dick in Matt’s hand, the shove of Matt’s just behind his balls. When Matt comes against him, grunts into his neck, it shouldn’t feel so good. They’re sweaty and disgusting; Matt still smells like pool, still tastes a little like chlorine, and now Jackson has spunk in between his legs, warm and sticky. But it doesn’t feel disgusting. Doesn’t feel like an annoyance. It feels like completion. 

The look on Matt’s face is reverent, and maybe a little horrified. Scared. Jackson thinks about what a damning picture it makes. The two of them on top of one another, Matt’s wet clothes in a heap on the ground, Jackson’s peeled away like an x-rated picture show. Damning, damning, and yet – 

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” murmured over and over, only by now Jackson isn’t sure if he’s the one saying it.

It’s okay.


End file.
